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Release Notes in PDF format ...

Release of V6.10 TNT products 
May 1999

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Summary of New Features
  • System (peeking under the hood).  
  • Context Sensitive Help Procedures.  
  • LegendView.  
  • Visualization.  
  • TNTatlas (free!).> 
  • Import/Export.  
  • Geologic CartoScripts™.  
  • Editing.  
  • Database Management.  
  • Hyperspectral Analysis.  
  • Mosaicking.  
  • Create Geospatial Products (SML/X).  
  • Create Windows Geospatial Products (SML/W).  
  • New Tutorial Booklets.  
  • Languages.
• Dropping Platforms

  Solaris 1.x. Windows 3.1.

• Editorial and Associated News [by Dr. Lee D. Miller, President]
  • Crashing and Burning!  
  • Reviews.  
  • Geospatial Analysis Emerges.  
  • Modeling Users of Geospatial Analysis.  
  • Precision Ranching Proposal.
• MI/X (MicroImages' X Server)
• Macintosh
• Linux
• TNTsdk^TM 6.1
• TNTlite^TM 6.1
  • Prices
• TNTatlas^® 6.1
  • Changes
  • View-in-View
  • Installed Sizes
• TNTview^® 6.1
  • Changes
  • Upgrades
  • Installed Sizes
• TNTedit^TM  & Trade 6.0
  • Changes
  • Upgrading
  • Installed Sizes
• Getting Started Booklets
  • Status of Booklets
• TNT Reference Manual
  • Status
  • Help
• New TNT Features
  • System Level Changes.
  • Display Spatial Data
  • Geologic Cartoscripts^TM
  • Import/Export
  • Raster Combinations
  • Map Layout Templates
  • Database Constraints
  • Spatial Data Editor
  • Mosaicking
  • * SML for X
  • * SML for Windows (new prototype)
  • Hyperspectral Analysis
  • Internationalization & Localization
  • Installed Sizes.
  • Upgrading
• MicroImages Authorized Dealers

• Saskatoon—Digital Environmental Management, Inc.  
• Bolivia—GEOTEC s.r.l.  
• California—WorldGIS LLC.

• Discontinued Dealers
• Computers
• Prices
• Papers on Applications
  • * TNT Reviews.  
  • Rewarded Papers.  
  • Presentations.
• Promotional Activities
  • Madagascar Map.  
  • Hawaiian Islands 
  • LegendView.  
  • Lettuce Fields Plate.  
  • TNT products Brochure.
• Appendix: Abbreviations

Accompanying New Feature Illustrations

• LegendView in the Display Window (2 pages)
• Adding Personal Notes to Quick Help
• Profile and Plan Panes in 3D Simulation
• Geologic Map CartoScripts
• South Sierra Geology
• CartoScript Sample Map
• Using SML to Make Maps in a Series
• Constraining Database Field Values
• New “SML for Windows”
• Pixel Purity Index and Masking Aid Endmember Selection
• New Matched Filtering Options

Introduction

• LegendView: Provides a simpler and more intuitive means of controlling layers and automatically creating legends for
  them.
• Hot Keys: TNTedit now provides 65 hot key combinations for popular editing operations.
• SML: Rapid expansion continues with the addition of 68 new classes for import and export, 9 miscellaneous classes, and 29
  new functions providing the LegendView, surface fitting, more database constraints, layer controls for layouts, slope/aspect,
  and others.
• SML/W: Try the first prototype of a new stand-alone SML for Windows that does not use X or Motif and currently supports
  about 90% of the SML functions and classes.
• Mac DLLs: The Mac version of the TNT products widely uses DLLs.
• Getting Started Booklets: Most of the booklets are now current with V6.10 of the TNT products, and 3 new booklets are available.
• C++: All versions of all the TNT products are now compiled with C++.

System (peeking under the hood).

• DLLs reduce installed size for MacOS 8.x by 23 megabytes.
• New hypercube raster object losslessly compresses all hyperspectral images.
• TNTview and TNTedit have tutorial reminder/access dialogs at start up.
• Tutorial reminder/access dialog can be opened via Help menu.
• Geospatial Rendering Engine (GRE) now separated from X and Motif.

Context Sensitive Help Procedures.

• Context sensitive help system now uses HTML.
• Help is linked to section with details in reference manual.
• Add your own context help or operational notes.
• Add color illustrations of your results.
• Link/start documents (Word, PDF, MPEG, ...) from your help/notes.
• Add access to web sites from your help/notes.

LegendView.

• Completely new, alternative LegendView display panel as default providing a layer control/legend panel and a view panel.
• Combines functionality of ArcView display; the TNT Graphics Rendering Engine; measurement tools, regions, …; and X-based
  remote client/server operations.
• View panel and window toolbar are the same as the familiar (now alternative) View window.
• New toolbar icon to add layers from View window.
• Place new layer/legend panel at left or right edge of view panel.
• Drag and drop layers in layer/legend panel to control order of rendering.
• Hide or show layers in layer/legend panel.
• Delete layers with right button menu.
• Show multiline DataTips for layer names in layer/legend panel.
• Interactive renaming of layers in panel.
• Display or hide drop-down legend for each layer.
• Legend shows sample for each vector, pinmap, and TIN element style used in layer.
• Attribute controlling style shown next to legend element (for example, soil type name).
• Auto-generated legends for raster layers: area sample, color scale, or color sample.

Visualization.

• Attach a flight profile with a moving viewer position to a movie.
• Attach a plan view showing a moving ground position to a movie.
• Attach a zoomed, moving window plan view to a movie.
• Use template graphic to position add-on special views.
• Create movies in the AVI format.
• TNTatlas (free!).
• LegendView is now default display providing intuitive layer control and auto-legends.
• An object or file can start another program that uses it when selected via a link.
• Use the above to link to movie file and start viewer with that movie.

Import/Export.

• Import AVIRIS and ENVI hyperspectral images into hypercube object.
• Import MapInfo databases from native TAB format.
• Create, save, and use a format description to import vectors from text files.
• Import IDRISI rasters.
• Import Arc/Info ASCII file into raster object.
• Import JPL AIRSAR and other SAR from compressed Stokes Matrix to raster objects.
• Import Finnish Airborne Imaging Spectrometer (AISA) hyperspectral images.
• Import Japanese Spatial Data Framework 1/2,500 urban maps into vector objects.
• Import Geosoft XYZ file into a raster object.

Geologic CartoScripts™.

• Sample CartoScripts provided for rendering linear and point geologic features.

Editing.

• Hot keys for frequently used operations (for example, adding element operations).
• Line label assistant provides single table/field generation option.
• Right mouse button operation now has a “redraw” option.

Database Management.

• Set a maximum and minimum value for numeric fields.
• Control upper, lower, and mixed case for string fields.
• Entry into field linked to another table checked for match to primary field in that table.
• If a match is found after a few characters are entered, autofill the field with type-over.
• Options for mismatched entry into linked field: accept, show error, or show dialog.

Hyperspectral Analysis.

• Hypercube object provides lossless compressed hyperspectral images.
• Convert single hypercube object to and from multiple separate raster objects.
• Use regular visualization and Hyperspectral Explorer features with hypercube object.
• Toggle button automatically excludes atmospheric absorption bands from processes.
• Transform and analyze spectra using “sliding” parabolic least squares fit.
• Use Pixel Purity Index (PPI) to locate spectrally pure pixels.
• Use Derivative Matched Filtering (DMF) variant of MF to reduce terrain and noise effects.
• Locally Adaptive Constrained Energy Minimization (LA-CEM) expands MF to use spatial variability.
• LA-CEM and DMF reduce noise in results compared to Matched Filtering (MF).

Mosaicking.

• Use new rubber sheeting procedure that fits every control point entered.
• Processing areas can now be hidden.

Create Geospatial Products (SML/X).

• Display using new LegendView (see above description).
• Create layers containing map grid, scale bar, text layer, raise and lower all layers.
• Adds extensive Import/Export (70 classes).
• Incorporate surface fitting.
• Compute slope/aspect/elevation.
• Sample SML/X script to alter map layout to create a map series.

Create Windows Geospatial Products (SML/W).

• Try prototype of direct SML for Windows that works with any TNT key.
• Stand-alone SML/W interpreter, no Motif or X Server, only Windows 95, 98, or NT.
• Implement object-in, analysis, object-out script.
• Currently supports about 90% of all current SML/X functions without alteration.
• No display or graphics functions as yet.
• Standard Windows file selection dialogs.
• Windows-like RVC object selection dialogs.
• Color Windows-based editor for preparing scripts.

New Tutorial Booklets.

• Introduction to Hyperspectral Imaging
• UNIX: Setup Guide
• Introduction to GIS
• Many booklets updated to V6.10

Languages.

• Japanese, Chinese, and Turkish interface for TNT products.

Dropping Platforms

Crashing and Burning!

Are we all jinxed? Are we busy chasing will-of-the-wisps? As you recall, MicroImages launched into the addition of hyperspectral image analysis to TNTmips in anticipation of NASA’s Lewis satellite. Lewis would have provided you with a sampling of high resolution, low-cost hyperspectral images around the world. It crashed. I begin to wonder what forces are at work here as now our military and intelligence communities have time to try to block and control private and public efforts in this area. We also get to wait until the new millennium at best for these 3 new “politically controlled”, as opposed to “technology driven”, hyperspectral satellite attempts (see section on Hyperspectral Analysis below). Finally, this is topped off by the failure of the first two attempts at 1-meter systems. I do not know about you, but this kind of slipshod work is costing me money! I guess it is on to Landsat 7 and the high resolution offerings of other nations. So much, for the moment, for this aspect of American technology!

Reviews.

More Breast Beating.

TNTmips continues to get good reviews. Furthermore, when reviewed, more and more of its unique properties are being acknowledged. The enclosed MicroImages MEMO Testimonials and other Tidbits (V6.10) summarizes a review of TNTmips against all its major competitors for image processing software from PCI, ERDAS, ENVI, and ER Mapper. In my biased opinion, upon review of the entire article, TNTmips again, in aggregate, comes out tops when all image processing factors and features and price are considered. But wait, now we have just been evaluated and reviewed favorably against the most prominent and expensive Digital Photogrammetric Systems (see below and enclosed). This is a whole new crowd of competitors that has little in common, especially in price, with our image processing competitors. I suppose next we will be put up against a third set of world leaders in the GIS area, then surface modeling packages, then desktop mapping, and so on? If so, I am confident that with the features in TNTmips and those currently being added, we can stand the heat. I simply wish someone would do a comparative review of commercial geospatial analysis software!

Digital Photogrammetry Systems.

The latest issue of GeoInformatics, Volume 2, April/May 1999, has a comparative review entitled Shopping for a Digital Photogrammetric System, pages 28 to 47.In preparation for writing this review, Azubuike Nwosu, the technical editor at GeoInformatics in Germany traveled to several sites around the world that use the various products. MicroImages arranged for him to visit The NPA Group in the United Kingdom for a look at TNTmips.His review covers the following list of Digital Photogrammetry Products and includes the prices noted in US$ in the review. I guess TNTmips gets the checkmark for the lowest cost on average by an order of magnitude. Conspicuous by their absence from this list are ERDAS, ER Mapper, and ENVI.

TNTmips  from $3,600
from MicroImages. Inc., USA

DVP   from $15,000
from DVP Geomatique, Canada

SUMMIT PC $20,000 to $30,000
from DAT/EM Systems International, USA

ImageStation-Z$18,000 to $80,000
from Intergraph Corp., USA

PHODIS none listed
from Carl Zeiss, Germany

Ortho-Enginenone listed
from PCI Geomatics, Canada

VirtuoZo$15,000 to $40,000
from VirtuoZo Systems International, Australia

Softplotter $25,000
from Autometric, USA

Match-AT none listed
from INPHO, Germany

DiAP $50,000
from International Systemap Corp. (ISM), Spain

SOCET SET $20,000 to $100,000
from LH Systems, (LH alias Leica-Helava), USA

The following are his introductory comments in the article about TNTmips.The rest of his review of TNTmips continues on in similar complimentary manner and is enclosed for your reading. [Please note that MicroImages has never been an advertiser in this high quality publication.]

“I thought I knew the southeast of England very well, but Edenbridge surprised me. The setting for my evaluation of TNTmips is a classic constable painting—picturesque rolling fields and cute homes. The NPA Group is the UK distributor of TNTmips, but this is a full blown mapping company specializing in mapping from satellite imagery (including SAR processing). Many of their projects are for geological exploration and their clients include some oil companies. They have been using TNTmips for about 10 years, and have several systems installed for map production. On Windows-NT I saw a very colorful application, packed with landcover and image-processing facilities. But it has a comprehensive suite of photogrammetric software and qualifies to be in this group. You will find from the answers below that they are coming at it from a different direction—a remote sensing system with a photogrammetry ‘button’.”

Geospatial Analysis Emerges.

Territorial Imperatives at Universities.

Today, more and more professionals are recognizing that the older geo-component technologies are being integrated into something that is greater than the sum of their parts. Have you noticed lately the wider and wider occurrence of the use of the term “Geospatial” in the literature, the names of institutes and academic programs, and so on? Albeit, the understanding of the concept is still relatively limited to a few, but it is most certainly growing. At the moment, it is delayed by the territorial imperatives that exist in most university programs in the United States. Since Canadian, European, and other academic programs entered this area more recently, they appear to be more progressive in its management as a single concept.

In the United States in the past 20 years, it has become a tradition that the “new” technologies of remote sensing and GIS are taught in separate and usually uncooperative academic departments. GIS and cartographic methodology is usually taught in the geography program. Remote sensing applications are often taught in the department of their application, such as forestry, agriculture, geology, and even electrical engineering. Surface modeling is the forte of geology and is just now creeping into general programs in geography and agriculture. It is hard to advance the new concept of geospatial analysis when its teaching components are scattered across departments in different colleges or faculties that must compete with each other for funds in terms of credit hour production. But, progress is being made through the use of institutes and the increasing demand for graduates who have this broader-based knowledge and technical skill. It is those universities around the world that find a way to handle this cross-department concept that will become the leading “centers-of-knowledge” in the next generation.

Simple Economic Impediments.

The trade magazines, and to some extent most of the professional publications that we all read, have a vested interest in promulgating this GIS versus image processing separatism to their and all our detriment. I have been waiting several years for some trade publication to acknowledge a more lofty and higher calling by reviewing the software available for geospatial analysis. This review would have to include and compare most of the separate image processing and GIS products, since all of them advertise and promote some level of GIS, image processing, and other geo-component technologies. Several of these publications already convey this integrated concept in the articles they publish. Their authors already show the integration of these technologies into geospatial analysis whether it is so named or not. They also originally selected or have recently changed their names away from those that imply that they report upon only one of the component technologies.

When are these editors going to lead the way and move on wholeheartedly into this integrated technology? First, most of the articles are being paid for by software and hardware vendors, including MicroImages. Second, it is simple economics. These publications are free and paid for by advertisers. Their biggest advertisers are specialized and best known for one of the older geo-component technologies and its name (for example, the term “GIS” has become synonymous with Arc/Info). Fortunately, more and more of their advertisements for specialized, smaller, or add-on products are, when taken in aggregate, beginning to define geospatial analysis. Since their big advertisers call the shots with their money, it is still going to be a while before a review of geospatial analysis software is published. It is also a difficult review to prepare, as with many vendors, even the most basic geospatial analysis requires the assembly of several component products. It would be daunting to find someone who is willing and able to review all these component products objectively.

Where do we (MicroImages and our clients) stand?

Three years ago, TNTmips was favorably reviewed as the top image processing system in GIS World, a trade magazine. The May 1999 issue of GeoWorld, the same publication with a new name, has another review of the same image processing systems, wherein TNTmips is summarized in its last paragraph as:

“TNTmips is in a class by itself. It’s modestly priced (from $3000 to $6000 on Microsoft Windows based platforms, depending on resolution), runs on every type of computer, provides an amazing range of functions and is a competent raster and vector GIS. Also, the amount of documentation is astonishing, but it’s not well organized and indexed. The answer is there, but it’s hard to find. TNTmips has good interoperability with other software and data, and, if users can limit themselves to small datasets, they can run TNTlite, which is free! For those looking for a GIS and image processing solution, TNTmips may be the best single solution.”

The author of this review uses 4 of the 6 products reviewed, but not the TNT products. Please see the enclosed V6.10 MEMO: Testimonials and other Tidbits for more information on this article. This same publication is now planning a separate review article on GIS systems, which may or may not appear, and may or may not include TNTmips.

Modeling Users of Geospatial Analysis.

Those who develop commercial products often carefully model the users of the product before its design and production. The Japanese are the world experts at this. To date, this approach has been difficult in the creation of general purpose commercial software products that are deliberately targeted to a broad world-wide audience. Remember that spreadsheets were not built in reaction to a model of what you wanted to do but exploded into use based upon some innovative, individual initiative. Many aspects of the explosion of the private and commercial uses of the Internet are similarly uncontrolled, unplanned innovative combinations of technology and initiative. In a recent article, at least 10 different distinct users were modeled for general purpose software such as word processing, page layout, and spreadsheets. It is hard to logically develop a complex software product whose existing users and potential buyers are continually evolving. MicroImages has always taken the approach of trying to gradually adjust for your changing expectations by using frequent updates, which some of you hate and others love and demand.

Over the 12 years of the development of the TNT products from their image processing roots, our clients have evolved and metamorphosed, and we have reacted to these increasing varied demands. Our early clients, some of whom are right here with us today, were innovative early adopters. Most of those who have stayed with the TNT products over that long timeframe are now “power users” of geospatial analysis and have prospered by using the integration of GIS, image processing, surface modeling, and so on, to solve their increasingly complex problems. Other early adopters, who were only interested in image processing, have wandered off into other products, as some of MicroImages’ efforts were expended in the development of the GIS, surface modeling, and other techniques that are now important components of geospatial analysis. Still others have been forced to employ other products by government procurements that promote a monopolistic approach in the so called name of “standardization”.

Geospatial User Model V1.00.

Clients using TNT products have a very wide range of objectives in the use of geospatial analysis and in computer skills and motivation. At one extreme, there are the users of TNTatlas, APPLIDATs, and soon the new TNTserver products being introduced in V6.10.They are professionally focused on some other objective than geospatial analysis, probably do not know what it means and do not care, and generally expect to immediately accomplish a specific task without any training or previous use of the software product. Serving their needs requires the use of simple, discoverable, intuitive user interfaces or those with which they are already familiar. At the other extreme are the power users of geospatial analysis who combine image analysis, GIS, graphical relational database analysis, and so on. They prepare geospatial materials and complex analyses and request hundreds of new features for each new release, most of which must be provided through additions to the TNT products’ interface.

MicroImages’ challenge is to accommodate this wide spectrum of clients. One way this can be accomplished is by providing optional, alternative levels of complexity in the user interface. Another approach that has also been dictated by marketing considerations is stratification of the TNT products such as TNTview, TNTedit, and TNTmips. This feature stratification provides lower-cost entry points and removes the complexity and frustration of starting out with advanced processes that are more complex to operate and probably not needed. But, there are still casual users and power users employing all levels of the TNT products. For example, a client employing multiple TNTview products may want an easily used display procedure like ArcView or have a specialized power use requiring very specialized control of the view. The introduction of the LegendView does not remove any power user features from any TNT product. It simply allows them to be hidden, if desired, from those who are not power users, have already become experienced in using ArcView as a spatial data browser, and are confused by a lot of icons and complex controls such as those provided in the full Layer Controls window.

To aid us in the evolving design of the TNT products, MicroImages has been attempting to model the users of geospatial analysis methodologies. These models, coupled with marketing considerations, will help us determine what is added to the various TNT products and how to structure each product’s interface. These models will help you understand where the various TNT products are going and where and how you can use them personally, in your consulting, within your organizational structure, in your studies, and so on.

MicroImages finds that we can conveniently group our current and to-be-sought clients for geospatial analysis into three types:(1) casual users of geodata, (2) focused users of geospatial analysis, and (3) power users. You may fall into one or all of these groups, especially if you have been with us for several years. But, individual users of geospatial analyses who fit only one of these models have different expectations for their use of geospatial analysis. Gradually, the TNT products are being extended and altered to serve them all by:

•multiple user interface options (for example, TNTmips with several tiers of user interface complexity)

•abstracted but fully compatible products (for example, TNTview and TNTedit)

•customizable products (for example, APPLIDATs and SML for Windows)

•field data collection products (for example, an easily modified datalogger APPLIDAT)

•public products (for example, the new TNTserver and SML for Windows); and so on

Casual Users.

The casual user wants to draw on geodata layers, make and record measurements, and/or obtain information about a specific polygon. APPLIDATs, turnkey scripts, TNTatlas, especially the pending new TNTatlas for Windows, and TNTserver, provide the basis for serving the expectations of this user.

Casual users are busy doing some other personal or professional activity: planning a camping trip, buying a house, designing a road, siting a water well, and so on. First, they want to gain direct and easy access to one or more prepared geodata layers of a specific locale at low cost in time and money. Next, they want to make some simple measurement or simple spatial inference from the geodata. Finally, they want to print or embed these results into a report, diagram, or presentation. And, they demand to accomplish this using a familiar interface such as Windows, Mac, Internet Explorer, Netscape, Word, or one that requires no previous experience.

Focused Geospatial Analysts.

Those in this group often hold full-time staff positions as image processing and/or GIS specialists or simply have this task as part of a broader job description.They are generally employed by companies that use some specialized tools to support their principal business operation, such as marketing studies, resource inventories, specialized reference maps, real estate sales, and so on. They combine special corporate datasets, especially database materials and property holdings, with commonly available, prepackaged geodata such as county orthophotos, TIGER maps, county boundaries, census tables, and so on. Usually they want to buy existing geodata if it is available and create new geodata only for company-specific holding and interests.

ArcView, MapInfo, and TNTview directly target this group. These are users of geospatial analysis who do not often, but always should, “look under the hood” before they buy any geospatial analysis software to see how it organizes geodata, handles reconciling different map projections, crosses platforms, and so on. As a result, they end up requiring many software add-ons and often accomplish their tasks in circuitous and round-about ways. They can often be most easily identified by their frequent preparation of a wide variety of theme and pinmaps. At this time, this group uses a wide variety of specialized modular add-on products. Usually, before they are done, they have spent considerable money on these add-ons. TNTview and TNTedit are targeted at this group of users. LegendView, theme and pin mapping, interactive region analysis, and other features have been added to expand further into this group.

Power Users.

Consultants, university researchers, service companies, some students, and others make up this category. They may or may not be early adopters. But, they are constantly pushing the limits of the software and hardware technology to develop or update geodata sets, find new complex combinations and applications of geodata, lobby hard for new features of personal interest, and get directly involved in inventing or guiding our development of new geospatial concepts and procedures. These are the clients the two other groups turn to when they do not have the interest, ability, or motivation to assemble the required geodata, do not know how to perform the needed analysis, have worked themselves into a technological box, have only a short time to complete a task, have run out of time, and so on.

Power users who have detailed knowledge using TNTmips, TNTedit, and other specialized products are most likely to have the solution, can get it, or know how to add it via SML or TNTsdk. They solve the hard problems that confound the other users of TNT or other products. These are also the clients who can provide a solution on the desired platform at the lowest cost when all the required capabilities are understood and they are permitted to use the most cost-effective approach. This has been the traditional and longest served group of MicroImages’ clients. They may complain about user interface complexity but will find and use many of the esoteric features (and therefore undiscovered errors) in a particular TNT process. They are also, on a percentage basis, the most likely group to request that new and often very specialized features be added to solve their specific problem.

Precision Ranching Proposal.

Alas, it is not all good news. The MicroImages MEMO for V6.00 outlined a proposal submitted to NASA in which MicroImages was to participate using Landsat 7 and MODIS imagery, APPLIDATs, Internet, real ranchers, and so on. This project was not funded.

How did this all work out? Well, you can judge for yourself from these facts.180 proposals were submitted, and 12 were funded. Of the 12, 1 was funded to a private business.7 were funded to university laboratories.4 were funded to other federal government agencies. There was a stipulation in this NASA call for proposals that no federal government employee could be paid from the project. Thus, 1/3 of these NASA research project funds will go into federal overhead for other federal government agencies in the form of travel, equipment, consultants, imagery, and so on. It is really unfortunate that NASA has concluded that it must allocate 1/3 of these research project funds to buy the attention and good will of other federal agencies who have huge research budgets of their own.In effect, after all the effort these scientists put into the 180 proposals, 1/3 of the funds end up as a simple intergovernmental transfer of funds!

One of the 4 projects funded to other federal agencies was to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). It was entitled Prototyping Value Added EOS Data for Rangeland Management and Assessment. It was the only project funded that would deal with rangeland applications. Based upon my 35 years of experience and observation of the application of remote sensing in rangeland management by U.S. governmental agencies, I seriously doubt that this project will create or move a single new iota of the technology into practice in actual ranch management.

The USDA has an annual budget of billions of dollars. Certainly, the USDA is capable of directly funding any research and applications of space remote sensing that it concludes have any value. Furthermore, the U.S. Department of the Interior actually manages most of the federal rangelands through its Bureau of Land Management (BLM). The BLM has just written off and totally abandoned a $400 million dollar, 6-year contract effort to use GIS, remote sensing, document management, and related technologies in the management of federal lands, primarily rangelands.

Sour grapes, you bet! No one likes to lose out to a purely political decision. But, I guess inept government bureaucracies are the same all around the world and only vary in the amount of money available and wasted. But wait, one final quirk has appeared. I have just learned that someone in this new NASA-funded USDA project has just recommended that they use TNTmips as the best product for their “research”.

At the present time, MicroImages is adding new features to MI/X for W95, W98, and NT4.0 for Intel-based platforms. This improved X Server will be referred to as MI/X V2.00. All previous MI/X versions for these platforms, including those released with TNT products V6.10, will be referred to as MI/X V1.00. MI/X V1.00 will remain as is and free for all platforms. MI/X V2.00 will be sold for a nominal cost of US$25 by MicroImages via the Internet. MI/X V2.00 for the Mac may also be converted into a commercial product in a similar fashion by adding additional features to it.

MI/X V1.00 is quite stable, will not be altered, and contains the features needed by users of the TNT products. TNT products and upgrades will be provided with the latest version of MI/X. Many of the new features added to convert MI/X into a commercial product may not be of particular value in the operation of the TNT products. However, more of them will be of direct use in the TNT products when a product is being operated remotely via MI/X.

Version 2.00 of MI/X for Windows products will probably contain the following new features:

• Support shape extensions
• Enable use of font servers
• Support xdm
• Support backing-store/save unders
• Move MI/X preferences from Setup/Preferences/MI/X directly into MI/X
• Support the ALT-GR keys
• Support third button mouse emulation via keyboard
• Show IP address in “About…” box
• Create install system using InstallShield and add an “uninstall” feature
• Set up new download system that uses a single easy download via a zip or self extracting executable
• Create a version numbering system
• Add copy protection via FLEXlm
• When downloaded, allow a test period of 15 days before payment required (Buying continued use after 15 days requires purchase of an authorization code)

Macintosh

Terminology.

Introducing DLLs.

These DLLs and shared libraries provide the basis for further integration of the TNT processes. Gradually, clients are requesting that every common feature be available in every process (for example, automatic map projection reconciliation, region creation, measurement tools, GPS access, and so on). Attempting to accommodate these requests has been bloating each process by the replication of these code sections with corresponding increases in load times. This creates problems in maintaining duplicate code and checking it in each process by individual software engineers (especially when the main process is not actively being revised). Using DLLs and shared libraries means that TNT features common to several processes can be loaded once by the first process to use them and then shared by subsequent processes.

Significance of DLLs. What is the impact of this on the Mac version of the TNT products? The most obvious result is that the installed size of TNTmips 6.1 for the Mac has been reduced by at least 23 megabytes. Even further overall size reductions may occur in future versions as more integration takes place. Eventually, this means faster switching between processes, as the shared libraries will already be in memory. Gradually, more of the features we all consider standard in TNTmips will be in every process as they are rewritten to use these DLLs. Shared libraries mean that less code has to be maintained, reducing errors. Shared libraries mean that errors in shared portions of the code of a TNT product will be detected at MicroImages in any process tested rather than being hidden away in some infrequently used approach.

MacOS 8.6.

Troubleshooting Macs.

Nine out of ten times when you have a general application problem with any specific application, peripheral, or TNT product, you will find that it is due to conflicts in extensions. On the Mac, some extensions are patches to the operating system provided by Apple or a third party as part of their add-on product. Extensions can also be required libraries that function as DLLs that the product’s manufacturer is forcing to be loaded at boot up and forcing to be maintained in memory all the time to speed up the specific product’s performance. For example, installing Microsoft Office 98 adds a dozen new extensions to the Mac, most of which are special libraries. Drivers for all your new equipment are added to the extensions and loaded up when you start your Mac.

The Mac I am using to write this MEMO has 30 Control Panels and 132 extensions loaded when MacOS 8.6 beta is started up. At least 25 strange new extensions were added when MacOS 8.6 was installed, and many others were updated. Whenever I have a general failure on a Mac or a Mac hangs, it is usually due to conflicts within these control panels and extensions. As soon as I loaded a beta version of MacOS 8.6, I had to go looking for such a generic problem. Using the control panel to select a monitor resolution size hung this Mac. If I turned off all extensions and control panels except the Monitors control panel, I could change the monitor’s screen size. Eventually I found that Apple’s control panel for monitors was in conflict with their Apple Guide. Turning off the Apple Guide only, that I do not need, solved the problem. I have found this kind of error over and over when something generic will not work on the Mac, such as a failure on the desktop, a peripheral will not work, and so on. Repeatable problems of this kind are often causing your TNT products to crash. To see if your problem is with some particular control panel or extensions, it is easy to simply turn all of them off, reboot, and try to repeat the error. TNT products do not require any control panels or extensions to operate. TNTmips will also operate 10 to 20% faster with zero or only minimum extensions loaded.

 

TNT products will operate the fastest with all control panels and extensions shut off

LINUX

Evolving Kernels.

The following short paragraph will set the background for the situation MicroImages has been dealing with in connection with LINUX since V6.00 was released. It was published today in an article—Linux: think hard before getting in deep—by Pankaj Chowdhry of PC Week Labs, appearing in PC Magazine, 10 May 1999, pg. 5.

“The most vexing problem we ran into [at PC Week Labs] was with the Linux Kernel itself. There are countless revisions of the kernel available, and in tests we found that some Linux patches worked only with certain kernels or with specific versions of applications. This inconsistency could wreak havoc on departments trying to optimize a Linux server to run multiple applications.”

“Companies such as Red Hat Software Inc. and Caldera Inc. have tried to bring some stability to the Linux world by updating their Linux distributions only once every six to 12 months.”

Chasing LINUX’s compatibility with the TNT products has consumed significant time at MicroImages over difficulties in the use of V6.00 and the release of V6.10.Those of you who use LINUX or follow it in the technical news know that a new version of the LINUX kernel (2.0.36) was released in late 1998, and afterV6.00 of the TNT products was shipped! Redhat LINUX V4.1 with an earlier kernel (2.0.27) was used to check TNT V6.00.Redhat LINUX V5.2 required changes that were significant enough to require it to be prepared, at least for the time being, as a different and new platform. As a result, the V6.10 “B” CD contains 2 LINUX versions of all the TNT products, one for Redhat 4.1 through V5.1 (in other words, for a kernel before 2.0.36) and one for Redhat 5.2 (kernel 2.0.36).While Redhat 5.2 LINUX was used to prepare the TNT products for the newer 2.0.36 kernel, it is highly likely that they will also work with LINUX as distributed by others with the same kernel, such as Caldera’s OpenLinux and S.u.S.E.

Surprise, another new 2.2.5 kernel has become available as Caldera’s OpenLinux 2.2 and has just begun shipping as Redhat LINUX 6.0.Yes, that is 3 different kernels to deal with in 5 months. Among other new things, this newest 2.2.5 kernel supports Symmetric MultiProcessor (SMP) for use with PCs with 2, 4, and 8 processing chips. It also provides the basis for the implementation of the “Beowulf” concept of using distributed processing to build a parallel processing system. Beowulf uses many inexpensive stand alone computers and a high speed network to assemble a single powerful parallel processing computer which, with enough processors, can approximate the performance of a current expensive super computer.

Do any versions of the TNT products work with the newest 2.2.5 kernel and Redhat V6.0 in particular? Do not simply assume so! MicroImages does not know at this time, so proceed forward in this area with caution if you have production work to complete with your TNT product(s). Redhat 6.0 has just been shipped, and we have acquired a copy for our tests.

Be Cautious.

The strength of LINUX may be in its free-form approach, but its weakness may be that changes within it are not closely controlled by a single entity. As a result, variability can occur. By now you know that TNTmips is one of the largest and most complex software systems you own. Do not assume that because you already know that the other products you use do work on a version of LINUX that the TNT products will also. If you want to know if the TNT products work with a particular version of LINUX, it is a simple matter to download TNTlite and try it, since it is free and requires no key. The LINUX system you are using is also basically free, so you can see if the newest LINUX version, your other tools, and the latest TNT products are working on a newly bought, inexpensive desktop PC costing less than $1000.Is your frustration and expense in an untested switch to a new LINUX operating system on your operational systems worth $1000?

And Even More Versions.

[Extracted from PC Magazine, May 25, 1999, page 89.]“Another LINUX vendor, S.u.S.E. is also now shipping V6.0 and giving away V6.1 beta CDs [kernel unknown]. The U.K. edition of PC Magazine bundled a copy of V6.0 with a recent edition. When you buy the whole package, you get a 450-page manual and 900 software programs, all for $49.95.It is CD-bootable. Call S.u.S.E. at (510)835-7873 to order a copy or go to www.suse.com.”

MicroImages will acquire copies of OpenLinux 2.2 and S.u.S.E. 6.1.However, the critical question that you and we have to address is: how many different machines can be set up and maintained to test the TNT products for these versions? The most significant cost is not the hardware, but the personnel cost to set up Linux, add all the development tools, get it working on the network, debug the setup, and then test the TNT products.

Speed.

In the MicroImages MEMO for V6.00, the summary of a client’s report of high performance was reported for LINUX versus Windows for the TNT products. MicroImages has been so busy chasing the complications imposed by the various LINUX kernel versions that we have no additional first hand information on this topic. However, SML scripts are currently being developed that you can run to benchmark a variety of platforms you have or wish to “try out at the dealer’s location”. Since these scripts will run within TNTlite, they can be used to produce reports that compare the operation of the TNT products compiled from identical source code on each platform.

Those using TNTsdk who switch to the V6.10 functions library should now switch to the appropriate C++ compiler for your platform. The following C++ compilers are used for TNTmips:

Windows 3.1xuse Watcom C 9.5b, but discontinued with V6.00

Windows 95 (with Intel)  use Microsoft Visual C++ 6.0

Windows NT (with Intel)  use Microsoft Visual C++ 6.0

Windows NT (with Alpha)   use Microsoft Visual C++ 6.0

UNIX platforms   use latest version of C++ from GNU

Mac (with PPC)   use Code Warrior Professional 1.0

TNTlite™ 6.1

TNTatlas^® 6.1

Changes.

The addition of the new LegendView into TNTatlas is a very significant new feature. Clients using the free TNTatlas products can now control layers and legends in a very familiar way. LegendView makes a free, unique product even more unique. It is explained in more detail in the LegendView section below detailing new features of TNTmips. It now has a familiar set of layer controls and can automatically show legends. Be sure to see how LegendView works in the Display process and therefore in TNTatlas as illustrated in the two attached Color Plates both entitled LegendView in the Display Window. Your free upgrade to TNTatlas V6.10 is a must for anyone who is using an earlier version to gain access to this powerful feature. As usual, in addition to LegendView, other changes made in TNTmips processes are provided as part of TNTatlas. These changes are explained in detailed descriptions provided in the TNTmips New Features section and in the attached color plates. These improvements, which also migrated into TNTatlas, include:

• new context sensitive personal notes and help

• adding plan and profile panes into 3D simulations

• extensive SML additions

• a stand-alone Windows SML interpreter

• use of new geologic CartoScripts

• significant new import options

View-in-View.

Changes.

• new context sensitive personal notes and help
• adding plan and profile panes into 3D simulations
• extensive SML additions
• a stand-alone Windows SML interpreter
• use of new geologic CartoScripts
• significant new import options

Within the NAFTA point-of-use area (Canada, U.S., and Mexico) and with shipping by UPS ground. (+50/each means $50 for each additional quarterly increment.)
 

		Price to upgrade from TNTview
TNTview Product	V6.00		V5.90	V5.90	V5.70	V5.60	V5.50 and earlier
W95 and NT	$95		170	225	275	325	+50/each
Mac	$95		170	225	275	325	+50/each
LINUX	$95		170	225	275	325	+50/each
DEC/Alpha via NT	$125		225	300	350	400	+50/each
UNIX single user	$155		280	375	425	475	+50/each

For a point-of-use in all other nations with shipping by air express. (+50/each means $50 for each additional quarterly increment.)
 

		Price to upgrade from TNTview:
TNTview Product	V6.00		V5.90	V5.80	V5.70	V5.60	V5.50 and earlier
\W95, and NT	$115		205	270	320	370	+50/each
Mac and PMac	$115		205	270	320	370	+50/each
LINUX	$115		205	270	320	370	+50/each
DEC/Alpha via NT	$150		270	360	410	460	+50/each
UNIX single user	$185		335	450	500	550	+50/each

Installed Sizes.

TNTedit ^TM6.1

Changes.

Upgrading.

Status of Booklets.

Japanese.

All the Getting Started booklets are being translated into Japanese by OpenGIS, who will also distribute them. As of this time, approximately 50% of the booklets are available in Japanese. The target of OpenGIS is to have them all translated and current with V6.20.

Previously Completed Booklets.

[45 booklets already in your possession]

New V6.10 Booklets.

[2 new booklets added to V6.10 CD, total now 47]

• Introduction to Hyperspectral Imaging
• UNIX:Installation and Setup Guide

Partial New Booklet.

[1 new booklet added in incomplete form to V6.10 CD, total 48]

A partially complete booklet entitled Introduction to GIS has been installed. As usual, you can find successive versions of this booklet posted for downloading at www.micro-images.com/getstart/ as additional pages are added.

Updated Booklets.

The following Getting Started booklets have been updated to be current with V6.10, and the new versions are on your V6.10 CD.

• Sketching and Measuring    major revisions
• Using SML   major revisions
• Making Map Layouts    major revisions
• Managing Relational Databases    miscellaneous changes
• Changing Languages (Localization)    added new utilities

• Displaying Geospatial Data     minor revisions
• Introduction to Digitizing Soil Maps     minor revisions
• Analyzing Hyperspectral Images    minor revisions

Out-of-Date Booklets.

The following Getting Started booklets are not current with V6.10 products.

• Feature Mapping - rewrite hole filling process
• Vector Analysis Operations - minor revisions
• Interactive Region Analysis - added GeoToolbox changes
• Creating and Using Styles - added hatch patterns
• Making DEMs and Orthoimages - miscellaneous changes
• Importing Geodata - minor revisions
• Interactive Region Analysis - major revisions

Possible Future Booklets.[19 possible units]

Priority is still being placed on upgrading all existing booklets, and this is expected to be accomplished with the release of V6.20.Meeting this objective will allow more effort to be expended on several of the following new booklets. 

• Scanning
• Vectorizing Scans
• Using the Software Development Kit
• Surface Analysis Operations
• Using the Electronic Manual
• Introduction to Hazard Modeling
• Modeling Watersheds and Viewsheds
• Extracting Geodata
• Introduction to APPLIDATs
• Introduction to Remote Sensing
• Introduction to RADAR Interpretation
• COGO
• Enterprise Installations
• Using CartoScripts
• Introduction to Digital Photointerpretation
• Introduction to the MERLIN System
• Introduction to Automatic Mosaicking via GGR
• Introduction to Creating Management Zones for Precision Farming
• Introduction to PseudoDOQs from 35 mm Slides

TNT Reference Manual

• Basic System Operations(195 pages)
• Display(706 pages)
• Edit(287 pages)
• Process (1113 pages)
• Support(90 pages)
• Glossary(92 pages)
•  Appendix (19 pages)

2502 total

The HTML version of the Reference Manual installs into 35 MB with the illustrations or into 7 MB without them. The Microsoft Word version of the Manual is 74 MB. Last minute supplemental sections that do not occur in the on-line HTML version or Microsoft Word version were created for new processes and features. These sections were completed for V6.10 after the master CDs were created for the reproduction process. These 36 additional pages are included in supplemental, printed form as follows.

* Paragraphs or main sections preceded by this symbol “*” introduce significant new processes or features in existing processes released for the first time in TNTmips 6.1.

System Level Changes.

Installation.

Installation instructions for UNIX versions of the TNT products have been assembled in the Getting Started booklet: UNIX: Installation and Setup Guide. It will be installed in the V6.10 Getting Started PDF booklet library and shipped in printed form with new product shipments.

Macintosh DLLs.

V6.00 of the TNT products introduced the use of DLLs for the Windows platforms.V6.10 extends the use of DLLs to the Mac platform. The MicroImages MEMO that accompanied V6.00 provided details on the value of switching to the use of DLLs, which now extends to the Mac platform. In summary, DLLs on the Mac result in smaller and faster loading times for the TNT products for the Mac, since DLLs enable greater code sharing between processes. Even more important, the use of DLLs overcame a limit peculiar to the Mac—the number of functions a program can have. The TNTedit process hit that limit after V6.00 and would not compile until DLLs were introduced.

* Adding Personal Notes.

Introduction.

When we are intimately engaged in a project, we acquire a special kind of short term personal knowledge or “lore”. We all know that months, or even days later, many of the details will be lost from our short term memory. As a result, most of us take notes when we work out the approach to a new project, study a new subject, attend a lecture, or even study a technical book. These notes assist us in reacquiring those special ideas and procedures for reuse later in a similar situation.

Geospatial analysis has many components, some of them complex. Perhaps you use many of them periodically in a cursory fashion on a project, or perhaps you use only a few in a very detailed and complex fashion. You may experiment with a process to learn about how you might use it in your activity, or you may be engaged in a complex project with it. However, in either extreme you are expending effort and need a means of retaining your ideas in a context sensitive fashion.

Scope.

The TNT products, and TNTmips in particular, now contain a new help procedure that allows you to create personal notes in context. It enables you to quickly and easily add and keep your own notes in context where you can easily find them again for that process. These notes can be as simple as a few lines in your own words about how you accomplished a particular step in the process. You could save snapshots of your current results and save them as samples for your future reference. You can start a movie viewer and see your 3D simulation as illustrated in the attached color plate entitled Adding Personal Notes to Quick Help. They can also be as complex as links (in other words, URLs) that will start your browser and take you to someplace on a web site. For example, you could check microimages.com to see if the Getting Started booklet on that TNT process has been updated from the version you currently have installed. You might even want to check microimages.com to see if any errors have been reported in the process and new versions posted.

An interesting pending use of personal notes is in a new edition of an existing textbook on the use of remote sensing in geology. This revised printed edition scheduled for publication in 2000 will be supplied with a TNTlite CD and appropriate sample geodata. This new personal notes feature is being used by the author to provide special tutorials that use his sample geodata to illustrate the images and image processing applications in geology. Using this approach, many additional color illustrations can be provided that could not be economically included in the printed book to illustrate the application of each image processing approach in geology. And, even more important for the student’s understanding, references can be provided back into the printed text where the principles and concepts are elucidated.

Operation.

The personal help feature is embedded in a revised help system released in V6.10.To add your personal notes to a process, simply choose Help/On Window via a menu or click on a Help button, and this new Help window will appear, showing help for that process, which will be provided by MicroImages’ writers. Use the “Edit” icon it provides to open the TNT multilingual text editor. This will open the Text File Editor window. To make notes, simply type them in this window in your language. When you save this text and exit the editor, your notes will appear at the top of all other information in the help window, bracketed in colored bars. This and other features of the new procedure are illustrated in the attached color plate entitled Adding Personal Notes to Quick Help.

If you wish to use personal notes for more complex actions, you will need to learn a little about HTML (HyperText Markup Language). HTML can be entered in the same Text File Editor window to provide instructions and links in your notes to start other software you have installed to display a word processing page, show a movie, go to a web site (URL), and so on. Even if you are a beginning user of HTML, you can easily add these features into your notes using the information provided in the enclosed supplemental documentation entitled Personal Notes with Quick Help. Please also remember that products like Microsoft’s Word 97 for the PC and Word 98 for the Mac allow you to create text and layouts that can then be saved as HTML and added into your tnthelp.usr file (the file where all personal notes are maintained). You may find that creating HTML layouts automatically in these products is easier for you than learning to create HTML scripts in the Text File Editor window.

Backup Your Notes.

All the personal notes or more complex reference procedures you have added for any process are saved in your own personal tnthelp.usr file. Only one file is created for all your uses of a TNT product.V6.10 keeps your tnthelp.usr file in the same TNT directory as everything else. At this time, this file is not locked so that you can add new materials into it. Be careful that you do not erase this valuable and irreplaceable accumulation of your personal knowledge, examples, and procedures. Future versions of the TNT products will provide for protection of this file so that you do not inadvertently erase your notes. However, for the time being, please periodically create a locked copy of this file in some other directory, or even better, copy it off to your backup media to protect against the failure of your system or hard drive.

New Help System.

Previously, it was not easy to provide and maintain on-line help for the TNT products. Prior to V6.10, the provisions to make help context sensitive, right down to the interface component level, resulted in the help being embedded in the code for the process. This meant that the software eng